How to make a dictionary: WS 2008-9

Lexical semantics (1)

Overview

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Meaning

Words are signs

Sign and Content

According to Saussure's 'dyadic' (two-part) model of the sign, each sign is composed of:

  1. a 'signifier' (signifiant): the form of a sign
  2. the 'signified' (signifié): the concept of a sign

Relation between signifier and signified

The relation between signifier and signified is arbitrary, nevertheless a community must have a sort of agreement to be able to communicate with each other. Where this does not happen there are different languages.

Saussure's sign model

Saussures Sign Model

About concepts

Concepts are an abstract construct. They are intended for referring to the mental image of something rather then the concrete object "in the world". As the mental image may not be constant for every person (see for example the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis), concepts are only used in discussions and the concrete reference to the real world may be argued about.

Example of Saussure's model:

Applied Sign Model

A triadic model: the semiotic triangle

There is another dimension, illustrated by the semiotic triangle, it is the dimension of perception.

Semiotic triangle

The semiotic triangle expresses the difference in the perception of the concept and the concept itself.

Task

Describe the following examples in terms of signified and signifier (form and concept). Feel free to take notes.

Subject to change: Semantics

Pejoration
A word takes on a negative meaning in the course of the years
Example: German word "Weib" "Frau" --> something negative
Narrowing
Meaning becomes more specific
English "Chant" used to mean "sing", but now it can only be used for singing in church or on a boat.
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Definitions

Types of Definitions

All: a term (definiendum) is defined.

Rules for definitions

Problems with the rules of definition

Content- or analytical definition

Extensional definition

Genetic and operational definitions

Definition by context

Ostentive definition

Nominal definition

Deictic definition

Recursive definition

Example for a recursive definition

Task

With the definitions from your homework find examples for:

Relation between words and their meaning

Semantic Relations

Synonymy:
Two words that have (more or less) the same meaning.
Example: Grandmother|Granny; pass away|die;
Polysemy:
One word that have two (or more) (closely) related meanings.
Example: unit: family unit| entity
Homonymy:
Two words that have the same form, that is: they look the same, are pronounced the same, belong to the same grammatical class but their meaning is not at all related.
Example: bank (finances)| bank (river)
Antonymy:
Two words that are closely related (share the same word class, distribution, have the same hypernym) but their meaning is "opposite" to the other are called an antonym. In terms of logic a word A is an antonym of word B iff when A is true, B is not true.

Distinguishing polysemy and homonymy

The distinction between polysems and homonyms is not easy in some cases. When in doubt they are distinguished by their etymology (if they are derived from the same word they are polysems, if they are derived from two different words they are homonyms).

Semantic relations: words + sentences

Word level Sentence level
Synonymy Paraphrase
Antonymy Contradiction
Polysemy  
Homonymy  
  entailment

Homework for next week

  1. In the definitions you copied for last weeks homework, assign the class of each definition
  2. Take 5 of last week's homework definitions and rewrite the definition according to a different type. Which one did you select?
  3. Write definitions for: Ferdinand de Saussure; dictionary; lexicon; university; study; learn
  4. Find a photo of some item in your home on the WWW. Describe it in terms of the semiotic triangle!
  5. In an English language dictionary of your choice, find 15 words with more than 12 letters.

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